None of us had anything to do with dropping two atomic bombs on Japan but we are, oh, so guilty about it. We feel a racial guilt which has nothing to do with skin color but rather with being American, every single one of us.
However, you are absolved, my brothers and sisters, because there is nothing wrong with what you did. In fact, none of us were guilty, as Americans, since none of us were even there or had any part of it.
Absolution based on absentia may be a satisfactory legal device that's not the true basis for it since the Rockhouse sees no reason for assailing Einstein for the idea of the enormous power of nuclear energy nor Oppenheimer for seeing the idea and building it. There was no fault nor foul in any of that and it was scientific evolution in America and the world.
Note 1: the Rockhouse may use that #History tag for situations in which the presentation is based on unimpeachable recountings of history.
Note: there's an adjunct to this in discussion of creative vs practical intelligence elsewhere in Ithaka but no need to flog that here except in the case study since Einstein represented the creative intelligence which came up with the idea and Oppenheimer brought the practical intelligence to make it happen which well shows the difference between pure and applied science. There's no difference in IQ, mind power, or whatever; they only work in different ways.
In a war which saw the deaths of maybe thirty million people or more, the deaths of around one hundred thousand at Hiroshima were not even close to significant. It was also not significant that most of those killed were civilians since that was the type of war waged by all sides in which the deaths of civilians wasn't just a manifestation of the euphemistic collateral damage but rather it was by design.
Back to the time men rode to war on horses, the object has been almost invariably to destroy the cities so this side will win. That it happened again in Japan and Germany is not a surprise when, after all, Rome had been sacked over a thousand of years before.
We know from the Pacific War that many Japanese saw surrender as dishonorable and there were only two valid outcomes from combat since one is either victorious or killed by it. Based on that knowledge, the Rockhouse suggests and has no trouble believing taking Japan on the ground on their homeland would have been one of the most horrific bloodbaths in human history.
The Rockhouse sees no shame for the conduct of that war since all it was defensive in terms of protecting against a scourge which rose over the world and it was clear there was no alternative to stop it or you will be next to fall to it. There were various shames within it, even within the defenders, but those were not at all the policy of things for the defenders.
There was no dishonor in those who fought the war since the troops were ordered to do it and they knew they had no choice. However, there has been steadily lessening honor in those who conduct the war from the top with some early evidence of that in Cornwallis and his dispatch of Tavington even when Cornwallis knew of the savagery and brutality the latter would bring. That was the same Cornwallis who had decried the way Martin's militia had been targeting Redcoat officers since how will there be honor in a war if there are no officers to ensure it.
Historical accuracy: on that aspect, the Rockhouse cannot validate the truth of it except generally and the talk with Cadillac Man did not get that far last night ... but it will another time. Nevertheless, that example shall represent and it may be anecdotal or verbatim but there's not currently a way to validate that with absolute authenticity.
Nevertheless, the Rockhouse also absolves the American leadership of dishonor for giving the order to drop those bombs.
Note: don't even try in the faintest way to extend this absolution to the genocidal extermination of Jews and some other minorities which the Rockhouse perceives as radically different from the overall conduct of the war.
America came out of World War II as a fount for integrity, generosity, and sacrifice which the country bore well after WWII since then it extended that reputation with the Marshall Plan in Europe to help those nations rebuild. The Rockhouse is not aware of a similar plan directed toward China or Asia in general but that requires historical validation. Nevertheless, the Marshall Plan was real and you saw how Germany ultimately flourished after the war as did Japan.
As reviewed with Cadillac Man, there was dishonor after the war and one specific example was the way Americans and Brits treated the Jews who were fleeing Europe in the hope of finding Sanctuary in the Middle East. Despite protestations much later in Israel that Palestine never existed, the fact is Israel didn't until 1947. Regardless of the future history, the conduct of the Brits and Americans in that context was appalling since many Jewish refugees were subsequently interned on, I believe, Cyprus so, in effect, they had substituted one prison camp for another although neither by any overt act or deed of their own.
The actual dishonor came later since America was in possession of the atomic bomb while no-one else was. In the post-war, Russia built an atomic bomb as well and the reaction to that was the Continental Divide in the modern world history.
At this point, we need the subtext that it may be America's finest gift ever to the world in devising the system of checks and balances which prevents any aspect of the government from controlling or dominating any other and it also extends to maintaining peace in the world since there mustn't be any disturbance to the balance of power (i.e. the global checks and balances in which equal countries know they will only destroy each other in open combat).
My estimation of Harry Truman as a President is much lower than that of Cadillac Man since Truman committed, in the Rockhouse view, two of the worst fouls of any American President. First, he authorized the initiation of aboveground nuclear testing rather than engaging with the Soviets (at that time) to build a balanced peace. That failing has been extended to disastrous proportion through to the modern time.
Truman also authorized the CIA and he realized his mistake even before the end of his administration but he didn't stop it. Eisenhower saw that as well insofar as he was well aware the relentless military buildup in the postwar was a major mistake but he didn't stop it or the CIA either.
The one who carries, more than any other, the nuclear guilt of the world is Edward Teller since he took the concept of the A-bomb which had been used on Hiroshima and Nagasaki and devised from that the H-bomb which is vastly more powerful. Teller not only built that evil bomb but actively advocated for its use and consequent annihilation of any semblance of a balance of power in the world. (WIKI:
Edward Teller)
Teller promoted increased defense spending to counter the perceived Soviet missile threat. He was a signatory to the 1958 report by the military sub-panel of the Rockefeller Brothers funded Special Studies Project, which called for a $3 billion annual increase in America's military budget.
- WIKI
The same circumstance has not changed since America's purpose has been to dominate rather than establish a stable balance of power to ensure peace in a world which would be loving if it ever got a chance to show it.
The CIA was an enormous part of that drive for domination and proceeded through all manner of insidious means to facilitate that even when it defied any honor, sensibility, or sense of reason.
Note: I'm not going to trundle out again the citations on that since the abominations committed by the CIA are well-documented with one of the earliest being the assassination of Salvador Allende in Chile in 1963.
Just as Truman failed to recognize the necessity for the balance of power even when he knew or should have known the fundamental importance of checks and balances in American government, people have extended that failure to the modern situation and the reason that happened is Washington has been steadily undermining any checks against unrestrained growth of the military.
The Rockhouse has also made that point multiple times and there's no reason to do it again since the interested student can readily observe America has been pouring over half of America's tax gold onto the military ever since Reagan and without any serious diminution during that period since actually it was the opposite and Reagan become kind of the odd chicken out for wanton military buildup when much more followed him.
The theme of this piece isn't so much an admonition regarding America behaving badly since you know already. There was a bit of discrepancy with Cadillac Man regarding the Russians being so militaristic but the Rockhouse submits America tries to make them look like amateurs in militarism since it spends vastly more than Russia, China, or the sum of many of the world's biggest military spenders.
The Rockhouse further submits the deliberate destruction of the checks and balances required to ensure the integrity of the government was to steadily chisel them away to permit that unrestrained growth but We the People did not do that since much of it was surreptitious background skullduggery which, like many things in modern Washington, sought to subvert the checks and balances inherent and required in American democracy.
In closing, the Rockhouse sees no foul in the American people although some own a fairly large part of it in advocating for that strong military government while simultaneously decrying the power of a strong central government. That aspect is logically unstable and obviously so.
Nevertheless, the overwhelming drive toward the destruction of the checks and balances has originated in Washington and typically in the dark. There is no intention here to pitch any idea of a deep state since we reject that categorically when peeling back the layers of the onion will reveal the rotten core of it which is the CIA smelling like rotting cabbage in a sewer.
The Rockhouse therefore submits there was no dishonor in using that atomic bomb and the use of it likely did save many lives. That takes us back to the Truman and hopefully that was the biggest mistake America will ever make since we won't survive one any worse than that. There is no doom and gloom in that since if there's anything worse than a nuke war then we know we might as well kiss our invisible rabbits goodbye.
Note: some may not believe Henrietta the Giant Invisible Rabbit is here with me but, mates, you will just have to take that one on rabbit faith.
If you care to continue this with a comedy twist, there's Ithaka:
The Perfect Politics of the Duchy of Grand Fenwick
The comedy in "The House that Roared" is dark since the premise is the best thing which can happen to a country is to engage in a war with America and immediately lose so no-one gets hurt. The logic is America shows its largesse to any place it has defeated and therefore losing to America is the next best thing to Christmas.
The failing in their plan as with "The Producers" was Grand Fenwick won the war which was, at once, a success and a failure so they didn't get anything and the entire story is dark in that way but quite funny.
